The present invention relates to a loading mechanism in a video cassette deck.
A conventional loading mechanism in a video cassette deck has a door for opening/closing a cassette insertion port provided in the front of a deck body, a cassette receiving portion movable between an initial location facing the cassette insertion port and a running location where a video cassette tape is made to run, and a cassette moving mechanism for moving the cassette receiving portion between the initial location and the running location.
The cassette moving mechanism has a pair of wall portions provided on both left and right sides of the cassette receiving portion, a slide arm attached on one of these wall portions horizontally slidably, a driving portion for sliding the slide arm, a cassette driving gear which is rotatably supported on the wall portion on which the slide arm is attached and which is connected to the cassette receiving portion through a groove portion formed in the wall portion, and a door arm for transmitting the motion of the slide arm to the door.
When the cassette receiving portion in the running location is moved to the initial location, that is, when a video cassette tape is ejected, the door is opened by using the movement of the cassette receiving portion from the running location to the initial location.
The running location of the cassette receiving portion is deeper and lower than the initial location. It is therefore necessary to first move up the cassette receiving portion when the cassette receiving portion is to be moved from the running location to the initial location. The rotation of the cassette driving gear for moving up the cassette receiving portion is transmitted to the door arm to thereby make the door open. Then, the door is opened toward the inside.
The above-mentioned conventional loading mechanism in a video cassette deck has, however, the following problem.
That is, since two operations, that is, moving up the cassette receiving portion in the running location and opening the door toward the inside are performed at the same time, it is required to provide a horizontal gap G between an opening fulcrum 521 of a door 520 and a front edge portion of a video cassette tape 400 such that the gap G has at least a height corresponding to the height of the door, as shown in FIG. 7, so that the video cassette tape 400 set in the cassette receiving portion and the door 520 located in the middle of opening operation should not interfere with each other.
It is therefore necessary to move the video cassette tape horizontally from the initial location at least to the extent of a depth corresponding to the depth of the video cassette tape.
On the other hand, recently, video cassette decks have been miniaturized by reconsidering the arrangement of parts and the mechanisms of respective portions, but it is required to provide a depth corresponding to the horizontal movement of a vide cassette tape for loading. In other words, when the quantity of horizontal movement of a vide cassette tape for loading is reduced, the depth of the video cassette deck can be also reduced.